Today's Cultural Warfare Update

I had a couple of other articles I really wanted to include here, but they weren't in my usual source set, and I accidentally lost the URLs. I told at least one person about them before losing the pages. Does anybody here have any idea what I'm talking about?

Regardless, here's today's news:

These guys, identifying themselves as a "Culture and Values" organisation, are cold-calling in Washington State; they're doing this in violation of do-not-call legislation all over the place as they are in part collecting surveys based on pre-biased data (they only count you if you give the answers they want); they're also a front for a for-profit video sales company. They're called the "Dove Foundation," so be on the lookout for that - they are very aggressive in their telephone usage;

Unnamed "members of the Senate" considering passing a law banning teenagers from social networking sites; g'bye, MySpace;

Focus on the Family article on splitting the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals;

American Family Association claims victory, says NBC will not show Madonna video;

FotF publicises a link of guidelines for political activities by pastors and churches;

FotF republishes a 2004 article calling pr0n the "true hate literature of our age"; claims pr0n causes homosexuality (and presumably bisexuality, tho' they never really talk about bisexuality); also abortion; calls GBLT people the "greatest threat to religious freedom today"; this one's a real cracker;

Another Focus on the Family article encouraging churches to endorse legislation and be more politically active, and so on; also the Alliance Defense Fund (a legal group dedicated primarily to antl-gay and anti-abortion-rights court cases) and the Family Research Council;

Focus on the Family kicks off a series of fall campaign rallies for fundamentalist and theoconservative voters; the first was in Pittsburgh;

Faith and Freedom Network, who has been covered here extensively and is allied with "homosexuality will destroy western civilisation" Focus on the Family, complains about the "politics of hate" that only its opponents seem to engage in;

FotF pushes a small assortment of Bush judicial nominees, demanding immediate confirmation (again);

FotF and Oklahoma Family Policy Council demand GBLT students be removed from anti-bullying protections in Oklahoma's schools; GBLT students were included as part of the reaction to the shootings at Columbine High School; says that including GBLT students in the anti-bullying protections violates the religious freedom of fundamentalists; includes ACTION ITEM to demand that the State Board of Education change the rules; claims that anti-bullying protections violate the rights of fundamentalist teachers to harass queer students present the ex-gay and fundamentalist 'point of view.' ETF: This summary re-edited to correct errors - see comments for details if interested (no, the strike text is not part of that, that's just my interpretation of the effort's actual intent, as I read it from their comments);

FotF: NBC must air "Veggie Tales" with evangelism intact; includes ACTION ITEM to tell NBC that taking out the bible segments before airing is unacceptable;

FotF complaints about GBLT-friendly companies in the US, praises companies such as ExxonMobil and Perot Systems which do not extend parallel treatment to GBLT couples (Focus calls them "special benefits," repurposing the "special" word again);

Focus on the Family Canada starts prepping for an anticipated fall revote on marriage rights in Canada (C-38);

Family Research Council: Don't be afraid of tax status, you can be as political as you want as long as you don't explicit endorse candidates without losing your 501(c)(3);

FRC: White House Press Secretary Tony Snow joins speaker lineup at "Values Voters Summit," the theocon confab/strategy meeting this weekend in DC;

American Family Association article on Tony Perkins and the "Values Voters Summit"; moral issues and political issues are now the same, all moral issues are political now;

AFA resorts the Canada Family Action Coalition doesn't think there will be a marriage rights revote until next year;

Catholic Georgetown University ends affiliation with evangelical groups; Alliance Defense Fund sends lawyers, says it's "discriminatory conduct";

AFA cranky that a professor they like didn't get tenure at UNC-Wilmington;

AFA promotes attempts national church "adopt-a-school" programme, discussed previously in these updates;

AFA quite upset at companies being LGBT-friendly;

AFA and Center for Military Readiness, a group which appears to exist mostly to fight women in the military, condemn protests against the ban on GBLT people from serving in the armed forces;

AFA attacks NBC for "anti-Christian bias";

Traditional Values Coalition condemns sex-education programme in Canada for including lesbian and gay people; says a new text "reads like lesbian pornography"; requests for copies by Americans shoot up 5000% - okay, not that last part, but it'd be funny; from what I'm able to glean from all the condemnations is that I suspect that this new text includes opinion essays from GBLT people, and they're quoting those opinion essays as examples of "indoctrination," but that's just a guess;

Canada Family Action Coalition condemns opposition to Harper nominees for judicial position, trying to transplant the judiciary wars from the US to Canada; much of the rhetoric is familiar; says "secular humanist" judges cannot be impartial ("neutral");

REAL Women of Canada condemns Ontario judge for hearing a marriage-rights case with a lesbian daughter; says he should have recused himself; accuses him of bias in judicial selection, and so on;

CWA reports that the "Unborn Child Pain Awareness Act" will be re-introduced in the Senate next week and rushed to the floor for a quick vote;

This is a bit old, but President Bush describes the theoconservative upsurge as a third Great Awakening.

( Articles and excerpts below )

finally

Today's miles: 1.3
Miles out of Hobbiton: 1329.0
Miles out of Rivendell: 864.0
Miles out of Lothlórien: 409.0
Miles past Rauros Falls: 0.2 about damn time
Miles to Isengard: 469.8

Very cool waterfall. And loud. In addition to the famous giant statues, of course, which did not have my twenty five dollars, the bastards. I also saw a much smaller stone monument to a human standing on some sort of half-wheel-thing half-buried in the ground - the alphabet it was in was very old and very worn, but I've seen it before. It spelled something like Teska. I wonder who he was?

I was thinking of heading further northeast to see the volcanoes, but with my bike broken, I think I'll follow along behind annathepiper and see if I can't meet up with her in Isengard. I hear the weather is better there and the roast boar is the best on the continent. Maybe they'll know who the little statue is supposed to be.

Also, saw some bald eagles. Made me feel just a little homesick. Ah, well.

Back in our reality, I'm kind of cheating with this photo as a flower picture, but it's pretty, so I'm posting it as one nonetheless:


Seeds Like Flowers

oops

This was an accidental post. I'll leave it up, I guess, but, well, um, it wasn't done. I mean, even the idea for it wasn't done. Or, put another way, "oops."

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The mainstream media continues to hail the "compromise," but anyone with half a brain recognises it for what it is: the legalisation of torture. Here are some examples.

( Actually, there's only one down here, because I didn't mean to post this yet. Oops. )

mostly just walking

Deeply lame today. Looking at insurance papers, trying to figure out how much this whole accident/hospital adventure (nobody should have to pay for a vacation that crappy, and yet) is going to cost us. Short answer: we dunno yet, probably five digits. Should be low fives, unless the insurance company decides to screw with us. Also read a bit and was good about doing all my physical therapy, but I'm generally good about stuff like that, so, well, there it is.

Tomorrow I should do some gardening. The weather's good for it, which is nice; there're a lot of blackberries and ivy to hack back. Someday when we have money again (funny how I keep having to say that again every time we start to get properly ahead, it's frankly kinda depressing) I look forward to doing something about the steep-hill back yard. That will help a whole lot, because that's where most of it comes from.

Classes start on Thursday. Hopefully I can go off the meds on time.

Today's (Saturday's) Miles: 2.8 less tired than after the 2.5 to the poll for voting; hey, it's a step
Miles out of Hobbiton: 1331.8
Miles out of Rivendell: 866.8
Miles out of Lothlórien: 411.8
Miles past Rauros Falls: 3.0
Miles to Isengard: 467.0

And a proper flower picture. Tomorrow I need to process more, I'm out of web-sized pictures again already!


Teacup Rose